Tobias Greenhalgh will be singing Maximilian in Bernstein's Candide with Palm Beach Opera from February 23-25 and Demetrius in Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Theater an der Wien from April 15-25.

Steven LaBrie is singing Escamillo in Bizet's Carmen at Sarasota Opera from February 17 to March 24 and Riolobo in Catán's Florencia en el Amazonas at Florida Grand Opera from April 28 to May 5.

Jarrett Ott is singing the title role in Rossini's The Barber of Seville at the Lyric Opera of Kansas City from April 28 to May 6.

John Adams is one of the best known and most often performed of
America's composers. Adams was born in Worcester, Massachusetts on
February 15, 1947. During his youth, growing up in Vermont and New
Hampshire, he was strongly influenced by the intellectual and cultural
institutions of New England. He received both his BA and MA degrees from
Harvard University, where he was active as a conductor, clarinetist,
and composer. His principal teachers included Leon Kirchner, David Del
Tredici and Roger Sessions.

In 1971, Adams began an active career in the San Francisco area,
teaching at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (1972-83) and
serving as new music adviser and composer-in-residence for the San
Francisco Symphony (1978-85).

Adams coined the term “post-minimalism” starting with his piece for string septet Shaker Loops (1978). This style is characterized by greater dynamic contrasts and a more fluid and layered sound. The completion and premiere of Harmonium in 1981 was well-received by critics and the public, establishing Adams as a major American composer. He was the winner of the 2003
Pulitzer prize.

Barihunk Ryan McKinny (left) and tenor Paul Appleby in Girls of the Golden West

His latest opera, "Girls of the Golden West," premiered at the San Francisco Opera on November 21, 2017 to decidedly mixed reviews. The cast included the barihunk trio of Ryan McKinny, Elliot Madore and Davone Tines and, like many of Adams' pieces, dealt with a slice of actual history.

A number of his pieces have leading roles for baritones, including J. Robert Oppenheimer in Dr. Atomic, Nixon in Nixon in China and the critical roles of the captain, terrorist (Rambo) and Klinghoffer in The Death of Klinghoffer. His oratorio The Gospel According to the Other Mary was written for tenor, soprano, mezzo-soprano and three countertenors!

Upcoming performance of operas by John Adams include Nixon in China at the Mainfranken Theater Würzburg in May/June 2018 and Dr. Atomic at the Santa Fe Opera in July/August 2018 with Ryan McKinny and Daniel Okulitch.

Monday, February 12, 2018

Baritones landed seven of the 24 slots for the inaugural Glyndebourne Opera Cup on March 22. The field will be narrowed to 10 finalist for the March 24th competition, which will be broadcast on Sky Arts.

The Glyndebourne Opera Cup focuses on a different single composer or strand of the repertoire. In 2018 the featured composer is Mozart and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment will accompany the singers at the final.

The winner
will receive £15,000 and the guarantee of a role within five years at
one of the top opera houses represented on the competition jury.

The international jury for The Glyndebourne Opera Cup includes representatives from top international opera houses. Among them are Barrie Kosky, Artistic Director of Komische Oper Berlin, Sophie de Lint, Artistic Director of Zurich Opera and Director Designate of Dutch National Opera, David Devan, who runs Opera Philadelphia, Fortunato Ortombina, Sovrintendente of Teatro La Fenice in Venice, and Joan Matabosch, Artistic Director of Teatro Real in Madrid.

Acting as the competition’s honorary president is Dame Janet Baker, whose own early career was fostered by Glyndebourne. As well as presenting the prizes, she will adjudicate at the live final.

Sunday, February 11, 2018

Italian barihunk Alex Esposito will be featured in two Rossini anniversaries within 30 days of each other.

The first will be a (slightly premature) celebration of the 150th anniversary of the composer's death with a performance of his Petite Messe Solennelle. The actual date of death of Rossini is November 13, 1868.

The first will be on February 19 at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin, followed by a performance on February 20 with the Berliner Philharmonie. Both casts include soprano Lauren Michelle, countertenor Bejun Mehta and tenor Francesco Demuro under the baton of Marc Minkowski.

Petite Messe Solennelle was written in 1863, thirty years after the composer's official retirement and thirty-four years after his last opera. The piece was originally composed for twelve singers (four of them soloists), two pianos and harmonium, but he later created an orchestral version. That version was never performed in his lifetime because he could not obtain permission to perform it with female singers in a church.

The bass solo aria in the piece is "Quoniam tu solus sanctus" (For You alone are Holy) from the Gloria, which after a short introduction, marked adagio, leads to an extended section, marked Allegro moderato with contrasts in dynamics.

Esposito has also recorded Petite Messe Solennelle with Antonio Pappano and the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia.

Alex Esposito sings "Cade dal ciglio" from Mosè in Egitto:

Esposito will then head to the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples for the 200th anniversary of Rossini's Mosè in Egitto, which premiered at the theater on March 5, 1818. He will perform the role of the Pharoah. There will be four performances between March 15-20 and the cast includes hunkentenor Enea Scala as Osiride and barihunk Mirco Palazzi as Mosè, for the March 17th performance. The Barihunks team will be in attendance! Tickets and additional cast information is available online.

The opera is loosely based on the Exodus from Egypt of the Israelites led by Moses. It opens as the plague of darkness is dispelled by Moses' prayer, and it ends with the spectacle of the parting of the Red Sea and the drowning of Pharaoh's host. Billed in 1818 as an azione tragico-sacra, the sacred drama with some features of the oratorio circumvented proscriptions of secular dramatic performances during Lent.

Rossini slightly revised the opera in 1819, when he introduced Moses' prayer-aria "Dal tuo stellato soglio", which became one of the most popular opera pieces of the day and which inspired a set of variations for violin and piano by Niccolò Paganini.

Mirco Palazzi and Enea Scala

The opera has only had sporadic performances outside of Italy and France. In the U.K. it was performed for 142 years after its premiere in 1822, and then not revived again until 1994. The Welsh National Opera staged it again in 2014 in Cardiff and on tour. This is the production that will be seen in Naples next month.

In the U.S., Mosè in Egitto had not been heard in Chicago since 1865, but it was presented in that city by the Chicago Opera Theater in 2010 and subsequently by the New York City Opera in April 2013.

In 1827 Rossini revised the work with a new title, Moïse et Pharaon, ou Le passage de la Mer Rouge for performances in his adopted home of Paris.

Canadian Mike Nyby will be making his role debut as the evil police chief Scarpia in Puccini's Tosca with Opera Ithaca. Nyby will be replacing fellow barihunk Zachary James, who had to withdraw for personal reasons. Nyby has previously performed with the company as Demetrio in Kristin Hevner Wyatt's Il Sogno and as Falke in Johann Strauss' Die Fledermaus.

Jake Stamatis (Photo: Joshua Bernard)

The cast also includes barihunk Jake Stamatis as Angelotti, Megan Nielsen as Floria Tosca and Paola Buffagni as Mario Cavaradossi. The semi-staged production will be performed at the Community School of Music & Arts in Ithaca on February 16th and at the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn on February 18th. Tickets and additional cast information is available online.

This is Nyby's fourth Puccini role, have previously performed Pinellino in Gianni Schicchi and both Schaunard and Marcello in La bohème. This is a homecoming of sorts for Nyby, who graduated from Ithaca College with a Bachelor of Music.

Wednesday, January 31, 2018

BariToned, the popular trio of big, brawny, beautiful men, which includes Joe Hager, Edward Miskie
and Caleb Albert, will be part of a double-header, post-Valentine's Day concert at The Green Room 42 in New York City on February 15th. The concert will start with "Always Andrews - A Musical Tribute to the Andrews Sisters," which celebrates the music and comedy of the legendary WWII-era trio of singing sisters. BariToned will then perform some of their songs from their "I Hate Men" show, including Bring On The Men, That'll Show Him, Wash That Man Right Out Of My Hair,
What You Don't Know About Women, Back To Before, and I Hate
Men.Tickets are $20 and are available online.

BariToned

Miskie
is a New York-based Pennsylvania native who has performed Julian Marsh
in 42nd Street, Cinderella's Prince/The Wolf in Into The Woods, Fred
Graham in Kiss Me Kate, Adam Pontipee in Seven Brides for Seven
Brothers, and many more. We recently posted about his book "Cancer, Musical Theatre, and Other Chronic Illnesses" which is available on Amazon and Kindle.

Joe Hager is a New York-based Kansas native who has performed Dennis Dupree in Rock of Ages with Norwegian Cruise Lines for the last seven years. Additional credits include the National Tour of Beauty and the Beast as Gaston, the international tour of Phantom of the Opera as Monsieur Richard, Tom MacKennle in the Seven Year Itch at the York Theatre. Additional credits include Javert in Les Miserables at the Palace Theatre, Sky Masterson in Guys & Dolls at the Metropolitan Ensemble Theatre, Macheath in The Three Penny Opera at the Brevard Music Center, and Marcello in La boheme at Hidden Valley Opera.

Caleb Albert grew up on the family farm in Calvert, Pennsylvania and graduated with a BFA in Music Theatre from Elon University. He has performed with Kings Dominion and Flat Rock Playhouse, as well as appearing in MT '17's Diva Cabaret, and Elon Cares: Broadway's Equity Fights AIDS.

Director Barrie Kosky's hilarious and highly entertaing The Pearls of Cleopatra(Die Perlen der Cleopatra) by
Oscar Straus is back at the Komische Oper in Berlin. The piece was on the shelves for more than eighty
years before it was revived in 2016. The latest run features almost the identical cast, led by German barihunk Dominik Köninger, who sings the role of
the Roman Officer and appears in a number of pretty sexy situations
throughout the operetta.

Kosky has been reviving works by composers who fled the Nazis, which
Strauss did in 1939 following the Nazi Anschluss. He fled to Paris and
eventually to Hollywood. After the war, he returned to Europe, and
settled at Bad Ischl, where he died. Straus' best-known works are Ein Walzertraum (A Waltz Dream), and The Chocolate Soldier (Der tapfere Soldat). He may be best remembered for composing the theme song from the 1950 film La Ronde.

In the comedic The Pearls of Cleopatra, the queen longs for a ‘little Egyptian flirting’ to lift her mood. The permanent drought and the armies
of the Roman Empire at the Egyptian borders have given her quite a
headache. So she flirts with the Syrian prince Beladonis and takes
Silvius, the Roman ambassador, as her new lover. International or
intimate relations – the most beautiful queen of the world holds sway
over the hearts of all men. Could the pearls be the secret to her power.

The Pearls of Cleopatra features plenty of scantily clad,
energetic performers on stage, adding to the lively Cabaret feel of the
pre-Nazi Weimar Republic. The operetta opens on January 31st and runs through March 30th. Tickets are available online. Opening night is SOLD OUT.

BARIHUNK BIRTHDAY FEB 16

Marco Vassalli sings Schubert's Ständchen

THE BARIHUNKS MISSION

1. To promote the baritone to bass voice range, especially emerging talent.2. To financially assist singers and promote opera through the sale of our calendar and tee shirts. 3. To make opera competitive with television and movies, by making it appealing to new audiences. 4. To promote good health and self-esteem. A great voice coupled with a healthy life-style prolongs careers.5. Keep opera positive! No bitchiness allowed! This industry is tough enough.

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DEFINITION OF A BARIHUNK

BARIHUNK: This site is dedicated to any hunk who sings in the baritone and bass/baritone range. Singers must be professional, semi-professional or serious students with real potential.